Togo update, 2018-present: Three Elections and a Constitutional Amendment

Wow, I haven't posted on here about Togo since 2017. That's not good! Since then, there have been 3 elections and a constitutional amendment. 

Legislative Election in 2018

Here's a link to my Monkey Cage post about Togo's December 2018 Legislative Election. Long story short, most opposition parties, in a coalition called C14, boycotted the election because:

... opposition members believed they had little power to change that outcome, whether they competed or not. They complained of an “independent” electoral commission dominated by the ruling party, legislative districts disproportionately favoring the ruling party, and government refusal to reinstate the term limits and voting provisions of Togo’s 1992 constitution.

The outcome of the election was:

The ruling party’s share of the legislature’s 91 seats fell from 62 to 59, but its ally UFC gained four seats, with the remainder going to minor parties and independents unlikely to constrain the government.

NOTE: Included in C14 was the ANC, the largest opposition party in the legislature before the 2018 boycott. One of the few opposition parties that competed in the 2018 legislative election was the MPDD, who won 3 seats (that doesn't sound like much, but it's the most of any opposition party). Remember the ANC and MPDD when we get to the presidential election in 2020. 

Constitutional Amendment

The newly elected assembly passed a constitutional amendment to re-instate a presidential 2-term limit, which had been eliminated in 2002 so the president's father could run for a 3rd term. It also restored the two-round system for presidential elections. That sounds good - reinstatement of term limits and the two-round system were two of the demands of the opposition, and were key components of the ECOWAS Roadmap. But the opposition wanted the term limits to be retroactive, since President Faure Gnassingbe is already in his 3rd term. By passing the amendment in a legislature elected without participation by the main opposition parties, the president avoided the trouble of passing the amendments in a referendum, which was supposed to be held in December 2018. 

Local Election in 2019

There was positive progress in June, when local elections were held for the first time since 1987. This time C14 did not boycott, although I'm not sure if that's because the rules were more fair or because they didn't achieve much from their boycott (the goal was to discredit the regime but turnout didn't fall by much and domestic and international actors didn't respond forcefully).  

The ruling party UNIR won 895 of the 1,490 municipal council seats. ANC won 134, C14 won 131, and UFC won 44. UFC was once the main opposition party, but the ANC was established as a breakaway party when the ANC leadership allied with UNIR:

After the 2010 election, the long-standing leader of the main opposition party, the Union of Forces for Change (UFC), Gilchrist (son of Sylvanus) Olympio, agreed to join a coalition government for the first time since the start of multiparty politics. Jean-Pierre Fabre, who ran as the UFC presidential candidate in 2010 because Olympio was disqualified, established a new opposition party, soon joined by most UFC members, called the National Alliance for Change (ANC), which is now the main opposition party.

Following the election:

Mayors were chosen by local councils in 2019 following that summer’s municipal (commune) elections. Most were members of the ruling party, but opposition parties captured some mayoral posts. Jean-Pierre Fabre of the opposition National Alliance for Change (ANC), who had placed second in the 2015 presidential vote with 35 percent, became mayor in the municipality of Golfe 2 in September. Regional governors are still appointed by the national government. 

That covers the main events of 2019. The other big one was legislation limiting public demonstrations passed in August. This was obviously in response to the massive demonstrations in 2017 and 2018. 

Now for 2020:

Presidential Election in 2020

The biggest event so far is the presidential election in February. The amendments passed in 2019 allowed Gnassingbe to run for a 4th term, and also changed the rules back to a two-round system. Opposition parties believed the one-round plurality system disadvantaged the fractured opposition parties, since a second round provided an opportunity for them to unite around a single candidate. 

With the two-round system in place, the opposition failed to unite around a single candidate in the first round. Half of the C14 parties left the coalition, most significantly the ANC. Six opposition candidates faced off against Gnassingbe, including Jean-Pierre Fabre (ANC) and Agbéyomé Kodjo (MPDD), the candidate of a new coalition of opposition parties and civil society organizations, the Democratic Forces (not to be confused with the 2002 Coalition of Democratic Forces), led by Monsignor Kpodzro, Archbishop of Lomé. Kodjo was a prominent member of the ruling party (then the RPT) under Gnassingbe's father Eyadema, serving as prime minister (2000-2002) and speculated to be next in line for the presidency, before he came into conflict with the president, after which he quit his post, fled the country, and was expelled from the party on counts of high treason. He returned upon Eyadema's death in 2005 and formed an opposition party. 

NOTE: Opposition party leaders emerging from the ruling party are a frequent occurrence in African politics - see Bleck and van de Walle Chapter 4. This colorful coverage describes the top candidates as "The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly" (Fabre, Gnassingbe, and Kodjo). 

In addition to the challenge of a fragmentation, the opposition faced the challenge of an ostensibly independent electoral commission (CENI) that continues to be stacked in favor of the government. According to the 2006 agreement that laid the groundwork for elections in 2007 after 12 years of election boycotts by the major opposition parties, the 19-member CENI should have 10 members from opposition parties, 5 members from the ruling party, and 2 each from the cabinet and civil society groups. Instead, the 2020 CENI has only 2 opposition party members among its 19 members.  The revamped Constitutional Court is also weighted in favor of the ruling party - of 7 members, 2 are named by the president, 2 by the UNIR-dominated legislature, and 1 each by the council of magistrates, lawyers, and public universities. Since the council of magistrates is named by the president, this enables his party to select 5 of the 7 Court seats. (2 more are supposed to be appointed by the yet-to-be established Senate.) With control of CENI and the government, a number of election rules and decisions favored Gnassingbe. For example, Fabre was prevented from holding several rallies in the north, the application by Togo’s Bishops’ Conference to monitor elections was rejected, and results were sent to CENI headquarters rather than announced at the precincts, a system that creates opportunities for vote rigging. CENI also revoked the accreditation of the National Consultation of Civil Society of Togo, which planned to field 500 election monitors, and the National Democratic Institute was expelled from the country. On election day itself, instant messaging apps such as WhatsApp, Telegram, and Facebook Messenger were blocked. 

Given those circumstances, it is little surprise that Gnassingbe emerged victorious from the first round of voting according to the official vote count, which award 72 percent to the incumbent, 19 percent to Kodjo and 5 percent to Fabre. These results are questionable given that 35 percent of voters supported Fabre in 2015, and in 2017 70 percent of Togolese responded to an Afrobarometer poll that Gnassingbe should not be allowed to run again in 2020 and almost 80 percent said they disapproved of the government's handling of the economy. Some also question the official turnout of 76 percent. International observers the government did allow to monitor the polls, mostly from ECOWAS, described the election as "peaceful and conformed to electoral law" and "without major incident."

After the election, Kodjo declared himself the winning, claiming to have vote tallies in his possession indicating he won between 57 and 61 percent of the vote. His suit with the Constitutional Court was rejected, and when he and Archbishop called for a protest, the government declared such protests illegal, surrounded both men's homes, and limited access to key roads in the capital to prevent the protests from being held. 

Later in March, Kodjo's parliamentary immunity was lifted on charges of disturbing public order by declaring himself the winner of the election, and in April he was arrested.